The Demented is a 2013 U.S. horror film written and directed by Christopher Roosevelt (producer of Ninja Cheerleaders). The film stars Kayla Ewell (The Vampire Diaries), Richard Kohnke and Ashlee Brian.

Six college friends unite for a weekend getaway where they find themselves fighting for their lives after a terrorist attack turns the local residents into rage infused zombies…

IMDb

“Ladies and gentlemen, we have our first gore free zombie film! And it’s really, really bad! Three couples meet up for a fun weekend.

Couple 1 – the very American, very politically correct boy and girl who are deeply in love and very annoying.

Couple 2 – the obligatory ethnic couple.

Couple 3 – the obnoxious rich couple with no morals whatsoever.

These people get chased by ‘zombies’ who are really mad. Probably because they have to walk around wearing smears of Ketchup, not even being allowed to nibble on those awful people. The worst thing you get to see is a scratch. Seriously. Avoid.” Dirk H, Letterboxd

“The film does win the award for possibly the worst CGI ever used in a movie, when a rocket lands near the house, it looks like the director of this .. movie? might have used the paint programme on his laptop to edit this sequence.” Better Than IMDb

Jason Lives: Friday the 13th Part VI is a 1986 slasher film, the sixth film in the Friday the 13th film series. The film was written and directed by Tom McLoughlin. Although the original concept called for Tommy Jarvis, the protagonist of parts IV and V, to become the new villain, the poor fan reception of Friday the 13th: A New Beginning prompted the producers to bring back Jason Voorhees as the series’ antagonist.

In resurrecting Jason, McLoughlin made Jason an explicitly supernatural force for the first time in the series, depicting him as being raised from the dead via electricity; this version of Jason—a zombie serial killer rather than a mortal superhuman—would become the standard depiction for the rest of the franchise, until 2009′s remake. The film’s score was once again by Harry Manfredini, who re-used familiar cues from the series but added more playful musical elements as befits the jokey tone. It also features tracks by Alice Cooper.

Despite being the second-lowest grossing film in the franchise to that point, it was the first film in the series since the original to receive positive critical reviews. In the years since its release, its self-referential humor and numerous instances of breaking the fourth wall have been praised for prefiguring Wes Craven’s Scream series and other similar 1990s horror films. As of 2003′s Freddy vs. Jason, Jason Lives was a fan favourite of the series, in addition to receiving positive notice from horror film historians.

Jason Voorhees has been dead for years, and the town of Crystal Lake has been renamed Forest Green in an attempt to distance its bloody reputation. However, Tommy Jarvis, after being released from an institute after an extended stay, intends to cremate the body of the infamous mass murderer. His friend Hawes accompanies him to the graveyard where they find and dig up Jason’s grave. Tommy loses control upon seeing Jason’s body and stabs it several times with a metal fence post. Suddenly, lightning from an oncoming storm strikes the post and resurrects Jason into a supernatural creature now much stronger than he had been before; he then kills Hawes by punching his heart out. Tommy narrowly escapes and flees to the sheriff’s station where Sheriff Garris recognizes Tommy and assumes he is hallucinating. Tommy tries to take the Sheriff’s gun before he is locked up. Meanwhile, Darren and Lizbeth, two camp supervisors are making their way to the lake where they hope to reopen the camp when they are stopped by Jason who kills them both with the fence post…

(No brainer!) Buy all 12 Friday the 13th films, plus more extras than you can shake a machete at from Amazon.com

‘Part 6 is hugely popular with fans because after the serious brutality of the last two instalments, this film injects some much-needed craziness and zaniness into the mix. A character speaks directly to us and chastises us for our choice of entertainment, little kids in potential mortal danger talk about what they would have been if they had grown up, and several camera angles make it disturbingly clear that a female counsellor is wearing a Maxi Pad. On the whole the atmosphere is relaxed and functions as a kinder and gentler film about a mass murdering zombie. The studio must have finally clued in that people were watching these things to grin and point as much as gasp and flinch, so they delivered.’ Mutant Reviewers

‘Jason Lives seems to divide Friday the 13th fans right down the middle. There are those that enjoy the playful aspect of the movie and enjoy its fast pace and sly humour, whilst there are others who feel that it is the one responsible for the series slowly becoming ridiculous and losing its edge. In a manner of speaking, both could be considered correct, but there is no denying how enjoyable Jason Lives actually is. Despite being heavily censored by the MPAA (much like the other Paramount-produced sequels), there is still a high body count and a selection of inventive set pieces.’ Retro Slashers

‘Along with bringing a welcome sense of humor, director Tom McLoughlin (also check out his undervalued 1982 supernatural chiller One Dark Night) makes Jason Lives easily the most visually interesting film in the series. It’s full of old-fashioned, gothic atmosphere, right from the very beginning when Jason is raised from the dead by lightning. McLoughlin knows that Jason is essentially a modern-age Frankenstein, and depicts him as such.’ Jason Alley, Letterboxd

Wikipedia | IMDb

Le Frisson des Vampires (English title: The Shiver of the Vampires) is a 1971 French erotic horror film directed by cult filmmaker Jean Rollin. It was his third vampire movie.

Having had many VHS and DVD releases, many of them on UK label Redemption, the definitive version of the film was released in the USA 2012 by Redemption/Kino Lorber as part of a five-disc Jean Rollin Blu-ray collection, along with La Rose de Fer, Fascination, La Vampire Nue, and Lèvres de Sang.

Two newlyweds, Isle and Antoine, are on their honeymoon, on their way to visit Isle’s two cousins. Unfortunately, they discover that her cousins died the day before. Nonetheless, they go to the chateau where they lived anyway. They are greeted by two female Renfields who show them to a room.

Isle goes to the cemetery to visit the graves of her cousins, and a woman named Isabelle tells Isle that she was about to get married to both of her cousins, but in a way she was already their brides. Isle decides to sleep alone on that night because she is upset. While getting ready for bed a woman emerges from the grandfather clock. She introduces herself as Isolde and takes Isle back to the cemetery where she bites Isle in the neck. Antoine, feeling lonely, goes to see Isle, but finds that she isn’t in her room. He searches the castle and comes to the chapel where it seems a human sacrifice is taking place. Two of the participants turn out to be Isle’s cousins and explain they must kill the woman or she will become like them — vampires. Antoine goes back to find Isle in her room and isn’t sure whether it was all a dream…

Wikipedia | IMDb | Watch uncensored trailer (nudity)

‘Rollin was a loveably scrappy underdog, and what he lacked in originality and budget he made up with imagination and sheer oddity. Shiver of the Vampires is easily one of his most visually interesting efforts. The set design alone is brilliantly kooky–see the wacko, wax-covered fishbowl with a skull in it–and Rollin goes wild with his cinematographer Jean-Jacques Renon, casting many scenes in bold washes of color. It’s surreal and psychedelic, doubly so when you factor in the film’s minor-key prog rock score, which gives Shiver a lead over the Hammer films, at least in terms of pure hipness.’ Casey Broadwater, Blu-ray.com

‘Shiver of the Vampires is a movie that works more as a treat for the eyes and the soul, rather than the brain. There doesn’t appear to be a deeper meaning to any of it, and it might seem that things happen in the film for no reason. Everything feels like a strange dream and on that level it works really well. This dream-like atmosphere is further enhanced by the use of some unusual primary lighting effects, the kind that Italian directors like Bava and Argento have also used to great effect. While many of Rollin’s movies are quite colorful, Shiver of the Vampires differs in the way that he uses the color to bath the locations in red. It’s a nice touch that sets the gothic castle apart from other horror movies that make use of similar settings.’ Ian Jane, DVDTalk.com

‘Shiver of the Vampires finds Rollin continuing to test thematic tools he’d revisit over and over (and over) again throughout his career. There are the ubiquitous female twins, the lesbian vampiress, the modern abandoned castle, numerous graveyard scenes, crazy lighting schemes, and numerous invented rituals. It all sounds very dark, but the film is really a blast. The vampire cousins, who seem much too old to be cousins of our bride, are fantastic characters, well drawn and exuberant, whose presence makes the film more fun than it has any right to be.’ Charlie Hobbs, TwitchFillm.com

Thanks to Wrong Side of the Art for some of the images above

Dead Snow 2: War of the Dead (Død Snø 2) is a 2013 sequel to Dead Snow (2009) directed by Tommy Wirkola (Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters).

The sequel follows the sole survivor of a Nazi zombie attack who battles an even larger army of zombies with the help of a professional gang of American zombie killers who call themselves the Zombie Squad.

Wirkola said of the new script: “[It's] bigger, scarier, funnier, more action-filled and gorier than the previous one.”

Son of Dracula is a 1973 British rock ‘n’ roll musical horror comedy film starring Harry Nilsson and ex-Beatles drummer Ringo Starr as Merlin the Magician, directed by Freddie Francis and produced by Starr for Apple Films. It is also the title of a Harry Nilsson album released in conjunction with the movie.

Starr had recently played drums on Nilsson’s album Son of Schmilsson, which had spoofed horror movie motifs. A few months after those sessions, in August 1972, Starr decided to make a rock and roll Dracula movie (originally titled Count Downe), and invited Nilsson to come on board. Keith Moon of The Who and John Bonham of Led Zeppelin both appear in the film, alternating as drummer in Count Downe’s band. Other band members include Klaus Voormann, Peter Frampton, Leon Russell, and the regular Rolling Stones horn section of Bobby Keys and Jim Price.

Soon after filming was completed in November 1972, Starr called in Monty Python‘s Graham Chapman, who was writing with Douglas Adams at the time and had been working on a proposed Ringo Starr TV special. They, along with Chapman’s other regular collaborator, Bernard McKenna, were asked to write a whole new script to be dubbed over the film’s lacklustre dialogue, and they recorded an alternative, Pythonesque soundtrack, but the whole idea was then shelved. Later, attempts were made to market the movie, but as Ringo Starr later said, “No one would take it.”  It was eventually released in the USA in April 1974 by Jerry Gross’ (I Drink Your Blood) Cinemation Industries distribution company.

After the killing of his father (Count Dracula, the Lord of the Underworld), by a mysterious assassin, a hundred years later Count Downe (Nilsson) is summoned from his travels abroad by family advisor Merlin (Starr) in order to prepare him to take over the throne. Baron Frankenstein (Freddie Jones, also in The Satanic Rites of Dracula and Vampira) is also on hand to help in any way he can. Problem is, Downe wants no part of this responsibility, and instead wishes to become human and mortal − especially after meeting a girl named Amber (Suzanna Leigh, also in The Deadly Bees and Lust for a Vampire), with whom he falls in love. He approaches old family nemesis Dr Van Helsing (Dennis Price, also in Twins of Evil and Horror Hospital), who agrees to enable the Count’s transformation, much to the dismay of the residents of the Underworld.

Despite the best efforts of a host of monsters, as well as one traitorous figure who is dealt with by the trusted Merlin, Van Helsing performs the operation and removes Downe’s fangs. He then informs the Count that he can now live out his days in the sunlight, with Amber at his side…

Wikipedia | IMDb

“It vacillates between unamusing comedy and what Starr considers ‘outre’. All the standard cliches are here, plus figures from the rock world, and while there is an obvious love for horror movies underlying the project, results are wishy washy.” John Stanley, Creature Features

House of Dark Shadows is a 1970 feature-length horror film produced and directed by Dan Curtis (Trilogy of Terror), based on his Dark Shadows television series. It stars Jonathan Frid, Grayson Hall, Kathryn Leigh Scott, David Henesy and Roger Davis.

This MGM film had a budget of a mere $750,000 and was a box office success, spawning a sequel, Night of Dark Shadows. Tim Burton’s supercilious remake, Dark Shadows, cost a whopping $150 million…

Seeking a legendary fortune in jewels, troublesome Collins family handyman Willie Loomis opens a hidden coffin in the Collins family crypt, releasing vampire Barnabas Collins from his 150-year confinement. Barnabas makes Willie his slave, then presents himself to the modern day Collins family (Roger, Elizabeth, Carolyn, and David) as a “cousin from England.” Barnabas moves into the “Old House” on the Collins estate, where the “first” Barnabas had lived. Elizabeth and Roger host an elaborate costume ball to honor Barnabas Collins. Barnabas becomes attracted to the family governess Maggie Evans, who looks just like his long-lost love, Josette. When Carolyn, who has become one of the vampire’s victims, threatens to reveal his secret out of jealousy, Barnabas kills her. Carolyn rises from the grave as one of the undead…

“Director Curtis makes the transition from the small screen with considerable vigour and adds the touch of unusual touch of trying to have a vampire killed of his ‘affliction’ by modern medicine. The film benefits from lavish MGM production value and some genuinely terrifying make-up.” Alan Frank, The Horror Film Handbook

“Playing, design and photography all achieve consistently high standards, and Curtis gives the conventions new force and resonance through a simple trust in their original power. The climax is particularly effective.” The Aurum Film Encyclopedia: Horror

“It positively oozes with gothic atmosphere and is crammed with derivative but extremely well crafted and memorable set pieces. It succeeds on two fronts, first in its transition to the big screen it avoids the visual blandness of most theatrical features adapted from concurrently airing TV series (Batman, Munster, Go Home!, etc.). Secondly, it accomplishes something done by almost no one else: all but inventing a style as effective as Britain’s and the European continent’s best horror films yet also one distinctive from those and even singularly American. In short, it’s one of the best horror movies of its era.” Stuart Galbraith IV, DVD Talk

“It’s also better than Burton’s film. The tone isn’t as erratic, the finale is more exciting (and less prone to out of nowhere idiocy), and Barnabas is much more interesting here. Depp’s version didn’t manage to be scary, so when he had to be a vampire it didn’t work, but Jonathan Frid really sells his character’s conflict of a guy who doesn’t want to be the monster he has to be in order to live. Production value is obviously diminished (being that the new film had roughly 40 times as much money with inflation factored in), but at least it feels like a singular vision instead of the result of a dozen producers, a major star, and an increasingly lazy “visionary” trying to have their say.” Horror Movie a Day

Buy House of Dark Shadows on Blu-ray from Amazon.com

Wikipedia | IMDb

Thanks to Wrong Side of the Art and Obscure Hollow for most of these images.

The Mummy is a 1959 British horror film, directed by Terence Fisher and starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. It was released on 25 September 1959. It was written by Jimmy Sangster and produced by Michael Carreras and Anthony Nelson Keys for Hammer Film Productions.

Though the title suggests Universal Pictures‘ 1932 film of the same name, the film actually derives its plot and characters entirely from two later Universal films, The Mummy’s Hand and The Mummy’s Tomb, with the climax borrowed directly from The Mummy’s Ghost. The character name “Joseph Whemple” is the only connection with the 1932 version.

Wikipedia | IMDb

Introduction:

In Egypt in 1895, archaeologists John Banning (Cushing), his father Stephen (Felix Aylmer) and his uncle Joseph Whemple (Raymond Huntley) are searching for the tomb of Princess Ananka, the high priestess of the god Karnak. John has a broken leg and cannot accompany his father and uncle when they open the tomb. Before they enter, an Egyptian man named Mehemet Bey (George Pastell) warns them not to go in, lest they face the fatal curse against desecraters. Stephen and Joseph ignore him, and discover within the sarcophagus of Ananka. After Joseph leaves to tell John the good news, Stephen finds the Scroll of Life and reads from it. He then screams off-screen and is found in a catatonic state.

Three years later, back in England, Stephen Banning comes out of his catatonia at the Engerfield Nursing Home for the Mentally Disordered, and sends for his son. He tells him that when he read from the Scroll of Life, he unintentionally brought back to life Kharis (Lee), the mummified high priest of Karnak. He was sentenced to be entombed alive to serve as the guardian of Princess Ananka’s tomb as punishment for attempting to bring her back to life out of forbidden love. Now, Stephen tells his disbelieving son that Kharis will hunt down and kill all those who desecrated Ananka’s tomb…

Guest Review:

The Mummy is a remake -– the result of Universal making a fortune with Hammer’s Dracula and throwing their archives open for the company to plunder in search of new material. However, Sangster’s screenplay dips liberally into Universal’s entire, mostly lamentable Mummy series, cherry-picking the bits that work and discarding the rest. Most notably, it rejects most of the original film, which only featured the bandaged title character in the opening scenes. By the time this film was made, audiences had a good idea of what a mummy movie should feature, and central to that was a marauding mummy.

The Mummy aims for a more epic feel than Hammer’s Frankenstein or Dracula, eschewing the gothic trappings for an atmosphere that is perhaps closer to later fantastical costume dramas like She. This attempt to bring a touch of class to the film is only semi-successful – the lengthy flashback sequence at the centre of the story certainly tries to be grand, but the budget really doesn’t allow for it, and the funeral procession feels rather scant, truth be told, with props that look decidedly unsolid. Luckily, the rest of the film more than makes up for it. Uniquely in the Mummy genre, this is a film that throttles along, with three or four impressive action set pieces and a story that defies its own thinness. Terence Fisher’s solid, if unimaginative direction keeps the action moving and overcomes the wordiness of Sangster’s screenplay.

Central to the success of the film is Lee’s portrayal of The Mummy. For audiences used to seeing Lon Chaney Jr shuffling along in pursuit of people who could escape him simply by walking at a steady pace, this must have been a revelation. We first see Kharis as he emerges from a swamp, covered in mud and glistening in the moonlight, and right away it’s an imposing sight. It’s not just Lee’s height and stature, though of course this is impressive – no hunched over figure here. More significantly, this is a Mummy who moves at speed and has immense physical strength – seeing him tear out the bars of the asylum windows, smash through locked doors and more or less run across the room reveals this to be, uniquely, a mummy that seems a genuine threat. It must have had the same impact as the first time people saw zombies run.

But there’s more to Lee’s performance than sheer brute force. While being buried under monster make-up again must have felt like a step back after Dracula and The Hound of the Baskervilles (and perhaps the flashback scene was also a sop to Lee allowing him dialogue and a regular appearance), his performance here is remarkable. Simply through his eyes and his physical stance, Lee is able to display determination, malice and pathos – his Mummy is, in the end, a tragic figure more than the mindless killer we see in other films. It’s easy to believe that this role could be filled by any stuntman (a belief Hammer clearly shared, given the casting in subsequent films in the series, Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb and The Mummy’s Shroud), but Lee’s performance here shows how wrong that is.

Cushing, conversely, has very little to do for much of the film. While he gives his usual committed performance, John Banning is a fairly bland character who spends much of the film spouting exposition. There is none of the fire and intensity of a Dr Frankenstein, Van Helsing or Sherlock Holmes in this character, sadly, though we get touches of it in the scenes where he battles Kharis one-on-one – these moments are not up to the dramatic climax of Dracula, but they’re not far short and show the chemistry and physicality that Cushing and Lee brought to the roles.

As the real villain, Pastell is suitably evil, though his character is at least allowed to be more rounded than you’d expect. When he argues with banning about the ethics of tomb robbing, you can’t help but think that – murderous mummy rampage aside – he might actually have the moral high ground. Yvonne Furneaux is very beautiful, but is given little to do other than let her hair down (apparently, neither Banning nor Kharis can recognise the resemblance to Ananka when it’s tied up!) and then be carried off, swooning, by the Mummy.

Although generally considered the lesser of Hammer’s original trilogy, The Mummy remains a fantastic film – pacey, dramatic and exciting, it is uniquely the only Mummy movie from either the Hammer or Universal series that can be called great (I’m not counting Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb here, of course!).

Blu-ray Disc review:

This new UK edition is a long-overdue high quality release for the film. As well as a fantastic new transfer that looks astonishing – even if it does sometimes expose the cheapness of the sets – the disc comes with extensive extra content. There’s a half hour ‘making of’ that is very much in line with similar, entertaining entries on other hammer discs, plus documentaries about Bray Studios and Hammer’s ‘rep company’ – the supporting players who turn up in several Hammer films. There’s also a World of Hammer episode about Cushing, a lively commentary from Marcus Hearn and Jonathan Rigby, and more. But the most impressive extra is the 1952 Hammer film Stolen Face.

This pre-horror melodrama tells the story of plastic surgeon Phillip Ritter (Paul Henreid), who falls in love with concert pianist Alice Brent (Lizabeth Scott) during a holiday. But she is secretly involved with another man (Hammer regular Andre Morrell) and runs away to Europe. Heartbroken, Ritter does what anyone would do – he remodels the scarred face of habitual criminal Lily Conover (Mary McKenzie) to be the double of Alice, as part of a dubious attempt to rehabilitate convicts who he believes are driven to a life of crime by their damaged appearance! But Ritter soon sees the folly of such dodgy ideas after marrying Lily, only to find that once a thief, always a thief. Meanwhile, Alice has ditched her fiancé and is now back on the scene.

A slight but entertaining thriller, Stolen Face mixes elements of Film Noir with straightforward melodrama and also looks forward to Fisher’s later work with another obsessed surgeon, Dr Frankenstein. Curiously, it also mirrors the plot – often in rather precise details – of the later ‘greatest film ever made’ Vertigo. I wouldn’t possibly suggest that the Hitchcock film is a copy of this obscure hammer quickie, but it’s certainly interesting.

Stolen Face is a film worth picking up by itself, so it’s inclusion on this disc is most welcome. If, for some bizarre reason, you were still unsure about this new edition of The Mummy, then this substantial extra should be the tipping point.

David Flint – Guest reviewer from Strange Things Are Happening

Baron Samedi (the slightly less impressive Baron Saturday in English, also Baron Samdi, Bawon Samedi, or Bawon Sanmdi) is one of the Loa of Haitian vodou, the spirits of the dead. Samedi is a Loa of the dead, along with Baron’s numerous other incarnations Baron Cimetière, Baron La Croix, and Baron Kriminel. He is the head of the Guédé (or Ghede) family of Loa, or an aspect of them, or possibly their spiritual father. His wife is the Loa Maman Brigitte.

Haitian Vodou, also written as Voodoo is a syncretic religion practiced chiefly in Haiti and the Haitian diaspora. Practitioners are called “vodouists” or “servants of the spirits”. The word is first documented in 1658 and is distinct, though very similar, to the practices of Voodoo in Louisiana, hence the differing spelling.

Vodouists believe in a distant and unknowable creator god, Bondye (Bon Dieu, literally ‘Good God’). As Bondye does not intercede in human affairs, vodouists direct their worship toward spirits subservient to Bondye, called loa. Every loa is responsible for a particular aspect of life, with the dynamic and changing personalities of each loa reflecting the many possibilities inherent to the aspects of life over which they preside. In order to navigate daily life, vodouists cultivate personal relationships with the loa through the presentation of offerings, the creation of personal altars and devotional objects, and participation in elaborate ceremonies of music, dance, and spirit possession.

Vodou originated in the French slave colony of Saint-Domingue in the 18th century, when African religious practice was actively suppressed, and enslaved Africans were forced to convert to Christianity. Religious practices of contemporary Vodou are descended from, and closely related to, West African Vodun as practiced by the Fon and Ewe. Vodou also incorporates elements and symbolism from other African peoples including the Yorùbá and Bakongo; as well as Taíno religious beliefs, and European spirituality including Roman Catholic Christianity, European mysticism, Freemasonry, and other influences.

Those in the Haitian Vodou practices that serve the loa are the Bokor. The Bokor are the Vodou priest/priestesses who can be hired to perform various sorcery. The Bokor practice both light and dark forms of magic. The Dark magic that they practice revolves mainly around the creation of zombies through the use of a mixture of poisons. These poisons are derived mainly from puffer fish and other poisonous substances.

The Ghede are the largest family of Loa in vodou embody the power of death and fertility. They are traditionally led by the Barons (La Croix, Samedi, Cimitière, Kriminel), and Maman Brigitte. The Ghede as a family are loud, rude (although rarely to the point of real insult), sexual, and usually a lot of fun. As those who have lived already, they have nothing to fear, and frequently will display how far past consequence and feeling they are when they come through in a service – eating glass, raw chillis, and anointing their sensitive areas with chilli rum for example. Their traditional colours are black and purple.

Samedi is often pictured as a tall, handsome black man, wearing a top hat (white or black), a black tuxedo and dark glasses. He carries a cane and smokes cigarettes or cigars and is sometimes shown with cotton plugs in each nostril, reflecting the practice of Haitian burials. Other representations show him with a more skeletal appearance. He is regularly seen swigging alcohol (usually rum) and is known for dancing, disruption, obscenity and debauchery, none of which get in the way of his actual duties of healing those near or approaching death, as it is only Baron who can accept an individual into the realm of the dead. Baron Samedi spends most of his time in the invisible realm of spirits. He is notorious for his outrageous behaviour, swearing continuously and making filthy jokes to the other spirits. He is married to another powerful spirit known as Maman Brigitte. Baron Samedi can usually be found at the crossroads between the worlds of the living and the dead. When someone dies, he digs their grave and greets their soul after they have been buried, leading them to the underworld.

Maman Brigitte is similarly crazed and drinks rum infused with hot peppers and is symbolized by a black rooster. Like Baron and the Ghede, she uses obscenities, protecting gravestones in cemeteries if they are properly marked with a cross. Baron La Croix (The Cross) is the ultimate suave and sophisticated spirit of Death – quite cultured and debonair. He has an existential philosophy about death, finding death’s reason for being both humorous and absurd. Baron La Croix is the extreme expression of individuality, and offers to you the reminder of delighting in life’s pleasures.

Baron Cimitière is said to be the male guardian of the cemetery, protecting its graves. His horses wear a tuxedo or tails and a top hat. They have expensive tastes, smoking cigars and drinking wine or fine liquor. They are just as crass as the other Ghede, but ape polite manners and upper-class airs while doing so.

Baron Kriminel is a much feared spirit or Loa in the Haitian Vodou religion. He is envisioned as a murderer who has been condemned to death, and is invoked to pronounce swift judgment. When a person becomes possessed by Baron Kriminel they shout obscenities, spit and try to stab surrounding people. If, during possession, Baron Kriminel is presented with food he does not like, he will bite chunks out of the arms of the possessed person. He sometimes calls for sacrifices of black chickens to be doused in petrol and set alight. The shrieking of the chickens when being burned alive is said to appeal to the cruel nature of Baron Kriminel and appease him. Baron Kriminel is said to be one of Baron Samedi’s many aspects. Baron Kriminel will often grant requests in lieu, he is said to return on Fete Ghede, the Voduns’ “Festival of the Dead” (November 2nd), to claim payment. Baron Kriminel is often represented by Saint Martin de Porres, perhaps because his feast day is November 3rd, the day after Fete Ghede. His colours include black, purple, white and deep blood.

Samedi ensures all corpses rot in the ground to stop any soul from being brought back as a brainless zombie. What he demands in return depends on his mood. Sometimes he is content with his followers wearing black, white or purple clothes or using sacred objects; he may simply ask for a small gift of cigars, rum, black coffee, grilled peanuts or bread.

The most well-known representation of Baron Samedi in film is undoubtedly in the James Bond film, Live and Let Die. Played by Geoffrey Holder, the film is somewhat ambiguous as to whether the character is a mortal man playing the Baron or is indeed the Baron of vodou lore. Perhaps a more successful representation of the Baron is in the 1974 film Sugar Hill where he is played by Don Pedro Colley, a film far more soaked in the traditions and practices.

Horror films have long used vodou or voodoo as inspiration, from early efforts likes White Zombie, I Walked With a Zombie, King of the Zombies and Voodoo Man to Hammer’s take on walking slaves, The Plague of the Zombies, Umberto Lenzi’s Black Demons, cinematic outrage Zombie Nightmare and Wes Craven’s The Serpent and the Rainbow. The latter is one of the bolder attempts to capture the essence of the Haitian’s beliefs and is loosely based on the non-fiction book of the same name by ethnobotanist Wade Davis, wherein Davis recounted his experiences in Haiti investigating the story of Clairvius Narcisse, who was allegedly poisoned, buried alive, and revived with a herbal brew which produced what was called a zombie.

Daz Lawrence, Horrorpedia

With thanks to http://satanicmojo.blogspot.co.uk for some of the pics.

Drakula halála – translated as ‘Dracula’s Death’ or ‘The Death of Drakula’ — is a 1921 Hungarian horror movie written and directed by Károly Lajthay. Currently believed to be a lost, the film is notable because it marks the first screen appearance of the vampire Count Dracula, though recent research indicates that the film’s plot does not follow the narrative of Bram Stoker‘s novel.

After originally opening in Vienna in 1921 and enjoying a long and successful European run, the film was later re-edited and re-released in Budapest in 1923.

Mary Land experiences frightening visions after visiting an asylum for the insane where one of the inmates claims to be Count Dracula (here following the Hungarian spelling Drakula), and she has trouble determining if the visions were real or if they were merely nightmares.

Buy Silent Screams: The History of the Silent Horror Film from Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

Wikipedia | IMDb

Groovie Goolies (originally Sabrina and the Groovie Goolies) is an American animated television show that had its original run on network television between 1970 and 1972. Produced by Filmation, Groovie Goolies was a spinoff of Sabrina the Teenage Witch Show (itself a spinoff of The Archie Show). Like most Saturday morning cartoons of the era, Groovie Goolies contained an adult laugh track. In 1972, a curious one-off special saw Warner Bros characters Daffy Duck and Porky Pig Meet the Groovie Goolies.

The Goolies were a group of hip monsters residing at Horrible Hall (a haunted boarding house for monsters) on Horrible Drive. Many of the Goolies were (in look and sound) pop-culture echoes of the classic horror-film monsters created in the 1930s and 1940s, mostly by Universal Pictures. The group sang a pop song each episode.

• Drac – The short-tempered vampire who is the head of Horrible Hall. He plays the organ piano in the Groovie Goolies.

• Frankie – An easygoing Frankenstein’s Monster who headed the Muscle-leum Gymnasium. He plays the bone xylophone/drums in the Groovie Goolies. Often would be zapped by lightning, revealing his inner mechanical workings and then remarking “I needed that!!” Frankie also had a dual identity as the inept superhero “Super Ghoul” (as seen in the song of the same name).

• Wolfie – A hippie werewolf that speaks in a combination of beatnik, surfer, and hippie slang. Wolfie plays a lyre-like instrument in the Groovie Goolies. Wolfie is always out for a good time (often by running wild, surfing, or driving his Wolf Wagon). He especially gets on Drac’s nerves.
  • Fido – Wolfie’s pet piranha that eats anything and can fly when necessary.

• Hagatha – A plump witch who served as resident chef. She also has a living broom named Broomhilda and is the aunt of Hauntleroy.

• Bella La Ghostly – A vampire who works as Horrible Hall’s switchboard operator.

• Dr. Jekyll and Hyde – The two-headed resident doctor who often fought as to which one of them was Jekyll and/or Hyde. The right head is a normal “human” doctor while the left head is a green-skinned “monster” doctor. He’s his own second opinion.

• Mummy – A bandaged mummy who dabbles in First Aid. Mummy serves as the newsman for “The Mummy’s Wrap-Up” newscasts. He would often became unraveled.

• Boneapart – A skittish skeleton in a Napoleon hat who had a tendency to fall apart.

• Ghoulihand – A giant, disembodied glove.

• Batso and Ratso – Two fanged imp-like brats with a penchant for coming up with plans for swiping treats as well playing mean practical jokes that often backfired.

• Hauntleroy – A rotund, conniving and selfish two-faced sissy kid in a sailor suit who was often the primary foil for Batso’s and Ratso’s tricks. He is the nephew of Hagatha.

• Icky and Goo – Two gargoyle-like creatures that seem to be the main pets of Horrible Hall. Icky is a blue gargoyle-like creature while Goo is a red gargoyle-like creature.

• Tiny – A diminutive, long-haired mummy with a high-pitched voice. He is the cousin of Mummy and a member of The Mummies and the Puppies.

• Missy – An enigmatic spook whose face was a large single eye and whose body was hidden by her long, pink hair. She is Tiny’s wife and a member of The Mummies and the Puppies.

• Mama Casket – A plump green mummy who is a member of The Mummies and the Puppies.

• Orville – A large thing-eating plant.

Wikipedia | IMDb

Dead Snow: Red vs. Dead is a 2014 Norwegian sequel to Dead Snow and Dead Snow 2: War of the Dead directed by Tommy Wirkola. It stars Vegar Hoel, Stig Frode Henriksen, Martin Starr, Ørjan Gamst, Monica Haas and Jocelyn DeBoer. The film will be making its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, in January 2014…

The gruesome Nazi zombies are back to finish their mission, but our hero is not willing to die. He is gathering his own army to give them a final fight.

A Return to Salem’s Lot is a 1987 horror film written, directed and executive produced by Larry Cohen (It’s Alive; God Told Me To; The Stuff). It was shot back-to-back with It’s Alive III: Island of the Alive. As the title indicates, the film is a sequel to TV mini series Salem’s Lot (1979) and is only very loosely based on characters created by Stephen King. It stars Michael Moriarty (Q: The Winged Serpent), director Samuel Fuller, Andrew Duggan (It Lives Again, Frankenstein Island), Evelyn Keyes, June Havoc and, making her screen debut, Tara Reid.

Joe Weber (Moriarty), an amoral anthropologist, has been lumbered with his dysfunctional adolescent son and returns to Salem’s Lot, the town of his birth, to find that it has been taken over by the undead. A few living people are kept around to provide blood for the vampires and to operate the gas station and shops in the daytime. Knowing of the anthropologist’s refusal to moralise about other people’s lifestyles (in the opening scene he is seen refusing to interfere in a human sacrifice and concerned only for the quality of the film he is shooting), the vampires employ him to write their story. As the vampires’ evil nature becomes clear, the anthropologist is joined by a Nazi hunter (Fuller)…

‘A Return To Salem’s Lot is a strange movie. It’s disjointed within its own logic, has very little to do with the King story and is bound to disappoint fans of the original book or miniseries. However, it has a lot of its own internal charm and despite the rather cheap-looking nature (such as the hilariously obvious set representing the “native” village at the opening), it is quite watchable … It’s certainly worth tracking down if you can, but it’s much more suitable for Cohen fans rather than fans of the original’ 80s Fear

‘Overall, however, there’s not much here to recommend to anyone that isn’t already a Cohen fan (apologist?), as it’s one of his lesser efforts and is dragging down a known property to boot. It manages to be better than most of the other King sequels (i.e. the Children of the Corn and Mangler followups), but that’s saying absolutely nothing.’ Horror Movie a Day

‘Organizing the basics of low-budget horror movie-making proves daunting for Cohen, as well. Granted, there’s not much he can do when money is tight, so you can forgive the opening human sacrifice set, which looks like the other side of the lagoon on Gilligan’s Island. However, why is the pacing so slow and…off here, and more importantly, why aren’t the attack scenes scarier? The first attack on the visiting teens cruising through ‘Salem’s Lot is laughably inept, and it’s compounded by the appearance of a completely silly-looking monster in the woods who is never properly explained in the context of the movie (it’s supposed to be Duggan, right?). A Return to Salem’s Lot should, before it does anything intellectual, scare you, and unfortunately, nothing’s too scary here.’ Paul Mavis, DVD Talk

Buy on Warner Archive DVD-R | Instant Video from Amazon.com

Wikipedia | IMDb | Thanks to 80s Fear for the VHS sleeve image

The Body Beneath (1969) is a British-shot horror film written and directed by American auteur Andy Milligan. It stars Gavin Reed, Jackie Skarvellis, Berwick Kaler, Richmond Ross, Emma Jones, and Colin Gordon.

The Reverend Alexander Algernon Ford, a vampire residing at Carfax Abbey in London, wishes to revive his ailing bloodline, which has deteriorated due to inbreeding. With the help of his mute wife, Alicia, his hunchback servant, Spool, and a gang of female vampires, he sets about contacting the last few members of the Ford family not already converted. After abducting a distant relative, Susan Ford, whose role is to sire a new army of vampire babies, the Reverend convenes a vampire feast where the future of the Ford clan will be decided…

A tale of incestuous vampires cruising the outermost branches of their family tree for new blood, this was the second of five films made in London by Andy Milligan in the late 1960s (the first, Nightbirds, was shot immediately before it, in late Autumn 1968). Milligan generally preferred period-settings for his horror films (the late 1800s in The Ghastly Ones; medieval England in Torture Dungeon), although his ultra-low budgets and nonchalant approach to mise-en-scène resulted in numerous visual anachronisms. The Body Beneath is the reverse angle: a modern-day drama one could almost mistake for ‘period’. The primary location is a Neo-Tudor house with carefully preserved Victorian furnishings, the women wear flouncy dresses of uncertain vintage, and two of the main characters, an evil vicar and a hunchbacked simpleton, could have stepped out of a Gothic Victorian fantasy. However, the glimpses of formica surfaces and Kays Catalogue knitwear are intentional this time; we’re definitely in the 1960s.

Villainous bloodsucker the Reverend Ford, marvellously played by Gavin Reed, is The Body Beneath’s most compelling creation. Reed (who died in 1990 at the age of just 59) knew precisely how to handle Milligan’s dauntingly overwritten material. With a lofty, supercilious attitude and immaculate diction he would have made an excellent mischief-maker in shows like The Avengers or Department S. “I was reading the papers – The Times of course – when I came across your name in the arrivals,” he sniffs to Canadian relative Graham Ford. (Note how actor Colin Gordon starts to improve his own enunciation in response, as if cowed by the Reverend’s impeccable English.) Milligan gives Reed most of the best lines: when hammering six-inch nails through the hands of his hunchbacked servant Spool as punishment for disloyalty, he muses, “It’s strange… I have no soul, yet I feel compassion. It doesn’t make sense, does it?” The Body Beneath appears to have been Reed’s only major role; he had a couple of parts in obscure TV shows in the 1960s, plus a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it appearance as a camp windowdresser in Carry on Loving (1970), but that’s about all. At some point in the 1970s he moved to the USA, but there’s an eleven year gap between Carry on Loving and his appearance in the oddball Bruce Dern vehicle Tattoo (1981). He turned up again as a snide theatre director bullying Dustin Hoffman in the early scenes of Tootsie (1982) but seems to have done little else on the big screen. Perhaps the theatre was his natural home?

A well shot sex scene introduces second-billed Jackie Skarvellis, and again, Milligan is well served; Skarvellis is a vivid, energetic performer who takes a relatively uninteresting character and makes her watchable. It’s rather a pity she wasn’t given a villainous role, because Milligan writes for his monsters far better than his heroines, and Skarvellis is the sort of performer who would gleefully sink her teeth into such an opportunity. Chiefly a theatre actor, she was one of the uninhibited London cast of the nudist stage show “Oh! Calcutta!” and went on to a busy career as actor, writer and stage director which continues to this day.

Berwick Kaler, who plays Spool, can barely recall making The Body Beneath, but says that his role took no more than two or three days to shoot. The main thing he remembers about ‘playing hunchback’ is that Milligan wanted him to stoop too much. Milligan may have been over-egging things, but since Spool comes across more like a child’s distant memory of The Hunchback of Notre Dame than a plausible depiction of disability perhaps it was simply a case of the director failing to convey the required tone to the performers. Either that, or he liked to see Kaler bent over…

Milligan’s stories often involve the travails of families riven by hatred, and The Body Beneath is no exception. The Fords’ vampire bloodline has been weakened by incest, requiring new donors, hence the Reverend’s attempt to track down and exsanguinate distant kinfolk. With smarmy relatives popping round for tea, and stilted conversation before murder, the film is like one of Mike Leigh’s suburban comedies crossed with an episode of the supernatural soap opera Dark Shadows.

Buy Gutter Auteur: The Films of Andy Milligan from Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com

“Set in the graveyards of England!” boasts the US one-sheet for The Body Beneath, and indeed, the film begins with an atmospheric scene in Highgate Cemetery. Chiefly, however, The Body Beneath takes place in a brooding Neo-Tudor mansion called  was shot in West Hampstead’s Sarum Chase, built in 1932 on the edge of London’s Hampstead Heath. The owner, Frances Owen Salisbury, died in 1962 and left the house to the British Council of Churches, after which it was available for film and photo shoots (see the gatefold inner sleeve of The Rolling Stones’ “Beggars Banquet” album and the nudie short Miss Frankenstein R.I.P.). Milligan gathered some wonderfully creepy shots at Sarum Chase, staged a crude ‘crucifixion’ in the mansion’s ornate gardens (one wonders how the British Council of Churches would have reacted), and returned a few months later to shoot a werewolf movie Curse of the Full Moon - later released in the States as The Rats Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here!.

In 1968, vampires and Gothic horror in general were still very popular in the UK, therefore Milligan’s decision to venture into the supernatural made sound commercial sense. Yet for reasons that remain unclear he eschewed the classic image-pool from which he could have drawn. The vampires in The Body Beneath have no fangs, they can move around in the daylight (albeit with special injections to counteract the sun), and they spend more time bickering with their victims than gnashing at their throats. Given that their leader lives in the liturgical splendour of ‘Carfax Abbey’ and wears priestly garb, one supposes too that this clan of peculiar bloodsuckers are immune to the effects of crucifixes and clerical paraphernalia, although this is never explicitly put to the test. Only in the semi-comedic and thoroughly wonderful Blood (1974) did Milligan at last give us a fanged vampire allergic to the cross.

Buy The Ghastly One: The Sex-Gore Netherworld of Andy Milligan from Amazon.co.uk| Amazon.com

When he does go for a touch of supernatural menace, Milligan handles it well. For instance, when Graham’s wife allows the vampires to enter the conjugal bedroom, their arrival is so creepy that we don’t think to ask how all four of them squeezed through one tiny window. The fate of a maid, eyes popped by knitting needles, is satisfyingly grisly, though inflicted on one of the few likeable characters, played by Elizabeth Sentance with a quirky charm not unlike British thesp’ Brenda Blethyn. The aforementioned prologue in the cemetery is a Gothic delight, with three female vampires, trailing coloured lace like some sinister Kate Bush cult, attacking a mourner in a graveyard. (The scene is further distinguished by Milligan’s wonky sound recording, which gives an unearthly warble to the vampires’ insinuating “Hello!”). Then there’s the vampire party in which, unusually, Milligan chooses eerie electronic music for accompaniment. It’s the sustained highlight of the film, and one of the best sequences he ever shot. With artfully blurred lensing and some accomplished low level lighting he creates a ritual haze of near-abstraction, redolent of underground/experimental films such as Kenneth Anger’s Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome. Less successful is Graham Ford’s off-camera demise, nibbled to death by vampire harpies while unconscious. It’s something of a let-down that we don’t see this stolid, handsome, but oh-so-boring hunk struggling for his life in a welter of gore. The pacing, too, is virtually non-existent. For instance, after the prologue we’re thrust into three consecutive dialogue scenes; long rambling discourses between Graham Ford and the Reverend, Susan Ford and her fiancé, and Candace Ford and her maid. This prolixity, however, is par for the course with Milligan. If you can’t dig the ceaseless prattle of his sniping, carping, endlessly debating characters, you’re never going to ‘get’ his films!

The Compton Cinema, Soho, owned and run by Milligan producer Leslie Elliot in the late 1960s.

Elizabeth: “Go to America? Never! What is America? What is it made of? Pimps, prostitutes, religious fanatics? Thrown out of England but a few short centuries ago. They’re the scum of the Earth.”

This scabrous attack on the USA comes during a ‘vampire summit meeting’ held by the Reverend Ford, in which he suggests that the assembled bloodsuckers should emigrate West. It is apparently word-for-word what Curtis Elliot, the bullying father of The Body Beneath’s producer Leslie Elliot, said during a row which brought to a violent end Milligan’s association with Elliot’s Cinemedia company. (How did the argument begin? Rumour has it that Elliot Snr. thought an offhand remark of Milligan’s was anti-Semitic; Leslie Elliot, however, believes his father deliberately took umbrage at an innocent comment.) Afterwards Milligan managed to eke out his finances for another three films shot in London (Bloodthirsty Butchers; The Man With Two Heads; Curse of the Full Moon) before returning to New York. The Body Beneath was never released in the UK, but it went on to play various 42nd Street dives throughout the 1970s, on a double bill with Milligan’s first film shot in 35mm, Guru the Mad Monk (1970).

Sadly, life didn’t get any easier for Andy back in New York. Despite or maybe because of his abrasive, combative manner he found himself regularly screwed over by producers and distributors. In many ways his sojourn in England was a highpoint of his career; he found himself wanted, in the homeland of the Gothic horror tale, making movies for a producer who admired him. Had he not so catastrophically fallen out with the man holding the purse-strings, who knows where his English adventure might have taken him?

Buy Nightbirds + The Body Beneath on BFI Blu-ray + DVD from Amazon.co.uk

The Body Beneath enjoyed one of the more startling renaissances in recent years when it was included as an extra on the BFI’s Blu-Ray release of Milligan’s Nightbirds.

Stephen Thrower, Horrorpedia

Related: The Ghastly Ones | The Rats Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here!

Outpost: Rise of the Spetsnaz (also known as Outpost III: Rise of the Spetsnaz) is a 2013 British horror film, first shown at the Edinburgh International Film Festival. Directed by Kieran Parker from a screenplay by Rae Brunton (writer of Outpost and Outpost: Black Sun). It stars Bryan Larkin, Iván Kamarás, Michael McKell, Velibor Topic, Laurence Possa, Ben Lambert, Alec Utgoff, Vince Docherty, Gareth Morrison, Leo Horsfield and Vivien Taylor.

In the film, “we discover the horrifying origins of these supernatural soldiers and see them in ferocious gladiatorial battle against the most ruthless and notorious of all military special forces: the Russian Spetsnaz.”

‘With producer and story credits on the first two instalments Kieran Parker makes his directorial debut and you can tell he knows the Outpost films inside and out. This is a plus – in terms of style and pace it slots in seamlessly with the previous movies – and also a minus: the film’s muted, muddy, khaki colour scheme has made the series rather monotonous. However it’s probably the most action packed yet with plenty of claret flowing and multiple zombie fatalities.’ Henry Northmore, The List

Buy on Blu-ray | DVD from Amazon.co.uk

‘The relentless, brutal and lovingly-rendered gore is all done in-camera too – fans of blood spurt will have plenty to delight over. The dialogue is riddled with more than a few action movie clichés, but this is no bar to enjoying the fast-paced, grimly serious character drama and epic bloodletting. For gore fans, this is a treat.’ Bram E. Gieben, The Skinny

‘There’s nothing more worthwhile to say about Outpost: Rise of the Spetsnaz. The story is weak, the script is pathetic, the muck-faced sprinting zombie is embarrassing and the sound design is a mix of gunfire, loud noises and shouting. It’s a shame, as the original film was a distinctly underrated and highly original little piece of work. With the direction it’s headed for this and the preceding entry, consider Outpost: Rise of the Spetsnaz the final nail in the coffin for what began as a promising franchise.’ Dread Central

IMDb

Frankenstein is a 2004 U.S. television mini-series directed by Kevin Connor (At the Earth’s Core, Motel Hell) from a screenplay by Mark Kruger based on the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. It follows the original book more closely than other adaptions. It stars Alec Newman, Luke Goss (Unearthed), Julie Delpy, Nicole Lewis, Monika Hilmerová, Donald Sutherland (Don’t Look Now), William Hurt (Altered States) and Tomas Mastalir.

Captain Robert Walton is a failed writer who sets out to explore the North Pole and expand his scientific knowledge in hopes of achieving fame. During the voyage the crew spots a dog sled mastered by a gigantic figure. A few hours later, the crew rescues a nearly frozen and emaciated man named Victor Frankenstein. Frankenstein has been in pursuit of the gigantic man observed by Walton’s crew. Frankenstein starts to recover from his exertion; he sees in Walton the same over-ambitiousness and recounts a story of his life’s miseries to Walton as a warning.

Victor begins by telling of his childhood in 1793. Born into a wealthy family in Geneva, he is encouraged to seek a greater understanding of the world around him through science. He grows up in a safe environment, surrounded by loving family and friends. When he is a young boy, his parents adopt Elizabeth Lavenza, an orphan whose mother has just died. Victor has a possessive infatuation with Elizabeth. He has a younger brother, William. As a young boy, Victor is obsessed with studying outdated theories of science, philosophy and alchemy that focus on achieving natural wonders. He plans to attend the University of Ingolstadt in Germany. Weeks before his planned departure, his mother dies of scarlet fever. At university, he excels at chemistry and other sciences, and develops a secret technique to imbue inanimate bodies with life with electricity. After bringing a deceased dog back to life he decides to create a life using parts of the dead…

Frankenstein has been filmed numerous times over the last hundred years – even if we disregard the sequels and the spin offs, we’re into double figures for versions of Mary Shelly’s novel. And over the last few decades, authenticity seems to be the selling point – while the Universal and Hammer versions of the story only really took inspiration from the book, claiming to be a faithful adaptation has been the thing to do since Frankenstein – The True Story in 1973. The fact that most of these versions continued to play fast and loose with the original story is neither here nor there.

Buy Frankenstein: 10th Anniversary Special Edition on Kaleidoscope DVD from Amazon.co.uk

This 2004 two-part television adaptation (not to be confused with another 2004 TV movie) might well be the most faithful rendering of the novel to date. But that isn’t necessarily a good thing – what works in a novel published in 1818 might not work in a film version shot 200 years later. And this production, while ambitious and handsomely mounted, is ultimately a dull affair that feels all too clearly padded to stretch the running time, yet still manages to skip over important aspects of the source narrative.

I’m sure you are familiar with the story by now – wealthy Victor Frankenstein (Alec Newman) has developed a childhood obsession with life, death and the metaphysical, and when he heads to university in Ingolstadt, he begins to experiment with returning inanimate bodies to life using the power of electricity. Before long, he’s stitched together a human being from stolen corpses, and succeeds in bringing it to life. But he’s immediately repulsed by what he has done and rejects the creature (Luke Goss), which escapes to be shunned as a monster by society. Growing increasingly bitter, the monster vows revenge against Frankenstein, slowly destroying all that he loves – his younger brother, his bride Elizabeth, his best friend Henry – until the two are brought together at the North Pole.

The plot – told in flashback by a dying Frankenstein to ship captain Robert Walton (Donald Sutherland) – certainly sticks to the main thrust of the novel, but aims to make the viewer sympathise with the ‘monster’, who is literate, tortured and ultimately only wants to be loved, but who is driven to vengeance by the fact that his ‘father’ despises him. Which is all well and good, except that the otherwise padded and plodding film manages to skip over huge chunks that might explain the relationship between the pair. It’s not just that the actual creation and revival of the monster is almost glossed over, treated more as an aside than the central point of the narrative. It’s also that there is nothing to show why Frankenstein suddenly sees his creation as an abomination and, more to the point, why he is so quick to attribute the murder of his brother to a monster that he hasn’t seen or heard of since it vanished on the night it was created. Why would he assume that (a) it is an evil creature, and (b) that it must be responsible for the killing? It makes no sense.

As for the monster, Goss gives a better performances than you’d expect – he’s actually quite moving in the final scene, and certainly plays it as a sympathetic victim rather than a monster, even when murdering the innocent. But his performance is let down by the fact that he clearly isn’t the hideous giant that we keep being told he is. This isn’t Christopher Lee’s grotesque creature from The Curse of Frankenstein, or even the Boris Karloff character. Instead, he looks like someone with a bad skin condition, which is hardly the sort of thing that would provoke such extreme reactions from those who see him, and although constantly talked about as if he’s eight feet tall, he’s clearly the same size as all the other characters in the film. Whether this was due to the censorial requirements of the Hallmark Channel or just the fear that making the monster as gruesome as he’s supposed to be would alienate viewers I don’t know – but it’s a massive blunder.

It’s a shame, because there is potential here. There could be a good 90 minute film to be culled out of this story, and the production values are impressive. Kevin Conner is a good enough director to ensure that this at least has a sense of style to it. Yet it’s needlessly long and lacks any real sense of drama, let alone horror. Any two part TV version of Frankenstein is bound to make you think of Frankenstein: The True Story, and this pales in comparison.

David Flint – Strange Things Are Happening (review of the UK Kaleidoscope DVD release)

Buy the US Lions Gate DVD from Amazon.com

Wikipedia | IMDb

From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series is an upcoming American horror/crime television series created by Robert Rodriguez. It forms part of the saga of film, direct-to-video, comic and cult following of From Dusk till Dawn, expanding on the chronicles of the Gecko Brothers: Seth and Richie, The Fuller family, and Santanico Pandemonium. The series will premiere on March 11, 2014.

The show will explore and expand on the characters and story from the film, providing a wider scope and richer Aztec mythology. It is planned to be broadcast by Rodriguez’s newly launched channel El Rey. The series features:

Wilmer Valderrama as enigmatic crime lord Carlos,

D.J. Cotrona as Seth Gecko

Zane Holtz as Richie Gecko

Jesse Garcia plays Texas Ranger Freddie Gonzalez,

Don Johnson in a recurring role as Sheriff Earl McGraw;

Robert Patrick (Terminator 2: Judgment Day, The X-Files) as Jacob Fuller

Madison Davenport as Kate Fuller

Brandon Soo Hoo as Scott Fuller

Eiza Gonzalez as Santanico Pandemonium

Adrianne Palicki portrays Vanessa Styles, a woman from Seth Gecko’s past

Lane Garrison plays Pete, the clerk at Benny’s World of Liquor which the Gecko brothers take over in the pilot

Jake Busey portrays Professor Aiden Tanner, an eccentric intellectual obsessed with the Mesoamerican mythology behind the vampires…

Orror (Italian: ‘horror’) was an Italian ‘adults only’ fumetti comic book published in two different series in the late 1970s. For the first series, publishers Edifumetto issued 21 issues from June 1977 to May /1978; for the second series, 6 issues were issued in 1979.

As was the case with most horror-themed fumetti, the comics and covers often depicted scantily-clad or half-naked young women being terrorised by all manner of predatory ghouls, killers and monsters. Artwork was sometimes based upon images from horror films, such as the first edition’s no.20 which shows a vampire modelled on actor Jon Pertwee from the Amicus movie The House That Dripped Blood (1970) but shows him as Afro-Caribbean, Blacula-style! The cover for number 10 seems to be derived from an image used to promote Blood and Lace (1970), although in this case the hammer murder weapon is replaced with an axe. Second edition, no.6 shows a vampire with a striking resemblance to Jack Palance, who played Dracula for TV director Dan Curtis in 1973.

We are grateful to Comic Vine for the cover images shown here. Visit their site to see more…

Zombeavers is a 2013 American sex comedy horror film co-written (with Al and Jon Kaplan) and directed by Jordan Rubin. It stars Bill Burr, Cortney Palm, Rachel Melvin, Hutch Dano, Jake Weary, Rex Linn, Brent Briscoe, Robert R. Shafer, Peter Gilroy, Lexi Atkins, Phyllis Katz and Chad Anderson.

A group of college kids staying at a riverside cabin are menaced by a horde of deadly zombie beavers. A planned weekend of sex and debauchery soon turns gruesome as the beavers close in on the terrified teens who must fight to save their lives…

‘Horny co-eds, severed feet, the great outdoors, and undead beavers chomping their way toward crotch, Zombeavers is more than just a simple film. It will make you laugh, it will make you cry, it will inspire great interest in mother nature, and it just might teach you something about love. For instance, in one scene a man says, “I’ve never seen a beaver up close.” His girlfriend responds, “You should try going down on me once in a while.” See? Life lessons.’ Lacy Donohue, Defamer at Gawker.com

IMDb

Dracula 2012 is an Indian Malayalam 3-D horror film directed by Vinayan, starring Sudheer Sukumaran, Prabhu, Monal Gajjar, Nassar, Shraddha Das and Thilakan. Portions of the film were shot in Bran Castle in Romania. It was released on 8 February 2013. The film was also released in Tamil as Naangam Pirai and in Telugu as Punnami Ratri with additional scenes and songs featuring Tamil and Telugu actors.

Reviews:

“To be be fair to the Count, Sudhir Sukumaran does look impressive with a nicely toned torso and the gelled hair adding to his countenance. The growls and the snarls could be worked upon of course, and so can the facial expressions which have mostly been limited to menacing grimaces. The ladies serve as eye candy, as they are expected to be. Technically, the 3D effects are quite notable, with drinks, arrows and what not thrown at your face. The shrubs and twigs that brush against your face initially are appealing, but they irk you in no time.” Now Running

“Now, it’s a daunting task to understand what was the director trying to say here. It’s not even scary and this Dracula looks more like a joker, with his funny lines and mannerisms. There is nothing like even a remotely decent storyline or a script here. The dialogues are trite, the performances are atrocious and the whole film is unintentionally comical.” Sify.com

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Sphere horror paperbacks were published in the UK during the 1970s and 1980s. They were hugely popular and many – such as Lust for a Vampire, Blind Terror, The Ghoul, Squirm and Dawn of the Dead – were movie tie-ins and novelisations. The initial novels chosen for publication focused on the occult. Sphere published pulp fiction novels by famous authors, such as Richard Matheson, Ray Russell, Colin Wilson, Graham Masterson, Clive Barker and Robert Bloch whilst also providing a vehicle for British career writers such as Guy N. Smith and Peter Tremayne, plus many lesser known writers whose work received a boost by being part of the Sphere publishing machine. Occasionally, they also published compilations of short stories and “non-fiction” titles such as What Witches Do. In the early years, like many other opportunistic publishers, they reprinted the vintage work of writers – such as Sheridan Le Fanu – with lurid cover art.

The listing below provides a celebration of the photography and artwork used to sell horror books by one particular British publishing company. For more information about each book visit the excellent Sordid Spheres web blog.

1970

John Blackburn – Bury Him Darkly

Robert Bloch and Ray Bradbury – Fever Dream

Robert Bloch – The Living Demons

Robert Bloch – Tales in a Jugular Vein

Angus Hall – Madhouse

Sheridan Le Fanu – The Best Horror Stories

Michel Parry - Countess Dracula
Sarban – The Sound of his Horn

Ray Russell – The Case Against Satan
William Seabrook – Witchcraft (non-fiction)
Kurt Singer (ed.) – The Oblong Box

Kurt Singer (ed.) – Plague of the Living Dead

Kurt Singer – (ed.) The House in the Valley
Robert Somerlott – The Inquisitor’s House

1971

Richard Davis (ed.) – The Year’s Best Horror Stories 1
Peter Haining (ed.) – The Wild Night Company
Angus Hall – The Scars of Dracula

Angus Hall – To Play the Devil – Buy on Amazon.co.uk
William Hughes – Blind Terror (Blind Terror film on Horrorpedia)

William Hughes – Lust for a Vampire (Lust for a Vampire film on Horrorpedia)
Ray Russell – Unholy Trinity
E. Spencer Shew – Hands Of The Ripper

Kurt Singer (ed) – The Day of the Dragon

David Sutton (ed.) – New Writings in the Horror and Supernatural 1

Alan Scott – Project Dracula

1972

Richard Davis (ed.) – The Year’s Best Horror Stories 2

Peter Haining (ed.) – The Clans of Darkness

Laurence Moody – What Became Of Jack And Jill?
Ronald Pearsall – The Exorcism

David Sutton (ed.) – New Writings in the Horror and Supernatural 2
Richard Tate – The Dead Travel Fast

Sam Moskowitz (ed.) – A Man Called Poe

1973

Richard Davis (ed.) – The Year’s Best Horror Stories 3
Stewart Farrar – What Witches Do: The Modern Coven Revealed (Non-Fiction)

Brian J. Frost (ed.) – Book of the Werewolf

Melissa Napier – The Haunted Woman
Daniel Farson – Jack The Ripper [non-fiction]
Raymond Rurdoff – The Dracula Archives

1974

Theodore Sturgeon – Caviar

1976

C L Moore – Shambleau
Guy N. Smith – The Ghoul

Robert Black – Legend of the Werewolf

Richard Curtis – Squirm

Ron Goulart – Vampirella 1:Bloodstalk

1977

August Derleth (ed.) – When Evil Wakes
Ron Goulart – Vampirella 2: On Alien Wings

Ron Goulart – Vampirella 3: Deadwalk

Vampirella on Horrorpedia

Ken Johnson – Blue Sunshine

Fritz Leiber - Night’s Black Agents
Robert J Myers – The Slave of Frankenstein

Robert J Myers – The Cross of Frankenstein
Jack Ramsey – The Rage

Ray Russell – Incubus
Andrew Sinclair – Cat

Colin Wilson – Black Room

1978

Ethel Blackledge – The Fire
John Christopher – The Possessors
John Christopher – The Little People
Basil Copper – Here Be Daemons

Basil Copper – The Great White Space
Giles Gordon (ed.) – A Book of Contemporary Nightmares

Peter Haining – Terror! A History Of Horror Illustrations From The Pulp Magazines

Peter Haining (ed) – Weird Tales

Peter Haining (ed) – More Weird Tales
Peter Haining (ed) – Ancient Mysteries Reader 1
Peter Haining (ed) – Ancient Mysteries Reader 2
Richard Matheson – Shock!

Richard Matheson – Shock 2

Richard Matheson – Shock 3

Stephen Marlowe – Translation
Michael Robson – Holocaust 2000
Peter Tremayne – The Ants

Peter Tremayne – The Vengeance Of She

1979

John Clark and Robin Evans – The Experiment
William Hope Hodgson – The Night Land
Robert R. McCammon – Baal

Kirby McCauley – Frights

Kirby McCauley – Frights 2
Jack Finney – Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
Graham Masterton – Charnel House

Graham Masterton – Devils of D-Day
Susan Sparrow – Dawn of the Dead

Gerald Suster – The Devil’s Maze
Peter Tremayne – The Curse of Loch Ness

1980

Les Daniels – The Black Castle
Gerald Suster – The Elect
Jere Cunningham – The Legacy
William Hope Hodgson – The House On The Borderland
Robin Squire – A Portrait Of Barbara

John Cameron – The Astrologer
Robert McCammon – Bethany’s Sin
William H. Hallahan – Keeper Of The Children

Ray Russell – The Devil’s Mirror

Roy Russell – Prince Of Darkness

1981

Basil Copper – Necropolis

M. Jay Livingstone – The Prodigy
Andrew Coburn – The Babysitter
Peter Tremayne – Zombie!

Graham Masterton – The Heirloom
Owen West [Dean R. Koontz] – The Funhouse
William Hope Hodgson – The Ghost Pirates

Graham Masterton - The Wells Of Hell
Graham Masterton – Famine
Marc Alexander – The Devil Hunter [non-fiction]
Guy Lyon Playfair – This House Is Haunted [non-fiction]
Robert R. McCammon – They Thirst

1982

Ronald Patrick – Beyond The Threshold

Peter Tremayne – The Morgow Rises

William Hope Hodgson – The Boats Of The Glen Carrig

Stephen Gallagher – Chimera
Marc Alexander – Haunted Houses You May Visit [non-fiction]
Michelle Smith & Lawrence Pazder – Michelle Remembers [non-fiction]
Dillibe Onyearma – Night Demon
Robert R. McCammon – The Night Boat

Ray Russell – Incubus

1983

James Darke – The Witches 1. The Prisoner

James Darke – The Witches 2. The Trial
James Darke – The Witches 3. The Torture

Basil Copper – Into The Silence
Les Daniels – The Silver Skull

1984

Peter Tremayne – Kiss Of The Cobra

Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 1
Clive Barker - Books Of Blood 2

Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 3
Graham Masterton – Tengu

George R. R. Martin – Fevre Dream
James Darke – Witches 4. The Escape

1985

Peter Tremayne – Swamp!

Peter Tremayne – Angelus!
Stephen Laws – The Ghost Train

Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 4
Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 5
Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 6
Rosalind Ashe – Dark Runner
James Darke – Witches 5. The Meeting
James Darke – Witches 6. The Killing

1986

Christopher Fowler - City Jitters

James Darke – Witches 7. The Feud
James Darke – Witches 8. The Plague

Clive Barker – The Damnation Game
Graham Masterton – Night Warriors
Lisa Tuttle – A Nest Of Nightmares

1987

Peter Tremayne – Nicor!
Peter Tremayne – Trollnight

Lisa Tuttle – Gabriel

1988

Alan Ryan (ed.) – Halloween Horrors

Guy N. Smith – Fiend

Stephen Laws – Spectre
Graham Masterton – Mirror
Eric Sauter – Predators
Robert McCammon – Swan Song

1989

Stephen Laws – Wyrm
Guy N. Smith – The Camp
Guy N. Smith – Mania

Graham Masterton – The Walkers
Graham Masterton – Ritual
Bernard King – Witch Beast

The listing above and many of the cover images are reproduced from the Sordid Spheres web blog. Bar the odd addition and amendment, the list first appeared in Paperback Fanatic 3 (August 2007). For more information about each title, its author and links to reviews, visit Sordid Spheres

Horrorpedia is a non-profit website. Please help us cover our web-hosting costs by buying from our affiliate links. Thank you.

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